


Soulbound

by Aelwyn



Series: Vignettes of Rose and the Doctor [8]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Daemons, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2019-12-25
Packaged: 2021-02-26 04:54:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21947650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aelwyn/pseuds/Aelwyn
Summary: In a universe where there are soulmates, a person's Daemon belongs to their soulmate. Now, just what does this entail for an Earth girl who has a soulmate from Gallifrey and vice versa...?
Relationships: Eleventh Doctor/Rose Tyler, Ninth Doctor/Rose Tyler, Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler, The Doctor (Doctor Who)/Rose Tyler, Twelfth Doctor/Rose Tyler
Series: Vignettes of Rose and the Doctor [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1436614
Comments: 34
Kudos: 462





	Soulbound

**Author's Note:**

> DISCLAIMER: ALL RIGHTS GO TO THE BBC, DOCTOR WHO, AND ANY OTHER AFFILIATES. THE CONCEPT OF DAEMONS STEMS FROM THE 'HIS DARK MATERIALS' NOVELS BY PHILIP PULLMAN. 
> 
> Pronunciation of recurring Daemon names, according to my preference for this story:  
> Aive: I’ve-Ah  
> Jayr: Jay-Er  
> Perdido: Pair-Deed-Oh  
> Peseshet: Pess-S-Het  
> Safya: S-Off-Yeah
> 
> The song for this story is “Hello My Love” by Westlife and can be listened to on YouTube here...  
> https://youtu.be/753Gl2VlPF8
> 
> For me it's about 10:30 in the evening. I just wanted to say Merry Christmas by posting my update on the 24th, because on the 25th I shall be very busy and I suspect others will be as well. Happy holidays, everyone. Only a week left in 2019!

Her name was Aive. No one told him this, but he knew it instinctively. As instinctively as what it meant, which was ‘ever, always, the one.’ He could think of no better fitting definition for the non-Gallifreyan creature that represented his soulmate’s soul.

Theta was aware even from a young age that Aive attracted a fair amount of attention and predisposed people to judge him, but he didn’t understand until he was older why something was wrong with him for having a soulmate who came from another planet. Specifically, Earth. He spent one long sleepless night researching the species of animal Aive had taken the pre-adolescent form of and eventually settled on a wolf pup. He was fascinated by the symbolism behind that; immensely loyal, fiercely protective, and unendingly loving toward their packs even if they weren’t related by blood or (in some far rarer cases) by species, a fact that didn’t escape his notice. Her soft, fuzzy fur was golden and her eyes whiskey brown with golden flecks in them and there was a stubborn determination that came with that gaze that he immediately loved. 

Aive was adventurous, brave, and quick at problem-solving on her feet. She had a tendency to curl up on top of his chest when he was sleeping and touch her nose to his, and the running. She loved to run. He ignored the way people turned their noses up at him for being matched to a human, often carrying Aive in his arms despite her squirming on the off-chance that the sound of his hearts beating in his chest would somehow become familiar to his soulmate wherever she was. That is, he tried to ignore it. But people that were more invested in his welfare, like his elder brother Braxiatel, the looks on their faces were harder to forget.

It wasn’t until he was much older that Theta would recognize that look as pity. 

Right around the time his voice was changing and he’d shot up a few inches in height, he noticed that everyone else’s Daemons were changing too. Also going through the awkward teen phase, as it were, except his. Aive was still a tiny puppy, easily able to nap on his chest and easy for him to pick up and tuck under his arm without much issue, and her words were small and uncertain when she rarely used them. It confused him for a bit; not because it was difficult to figure out mind, but because deep down he didn’t want to know the answer. 

Aive was aging far more slowly than the other Daemons because of their drastically mismatched lifespans. While he could spend centuries with his Daemon, the amount of time he would have with his soulmate would be about eighty years in total (and that was only if he got really, really lucky). 

For the first time in his life, Theta thought he understood why being a Time Lord and having a human soulmate was more of a curse than a blessing.

…^…

His name was Jayr. No one told her this, but she knew it instinctively. As instinctively as what it meant, which was ‘healer.’ She could think of no better fitting definition for the strange bird-like creature that seemed completely intent on making sure she never left his side. 

Rose knew almost instantly her soulmate wasn’t like anyone else’s. For starters, the age difference. He aged much faster than the other kids’ Daemons; by the time she was two, he was in his awkward tween stage. When she was five he appeared elderly. On a more immediate note that didn’t require a time lapse, his looks. He wasn’t an Earth animal at all. Sure, he had the soft muddled grey and silver markings of a Sooty Owl and even the body shape of one, but that was where the resemblance stopped. 

Two blue-dominant hazel eyes that could rotate in their sockets and a neck that wasn’t able to pivot almost entirely 180° on either side. Two ears where the slits should have been (at first glance giving it the appearance of a Great Horned); they were long and tufted and stuck out on each side of his head. He had five toes on his feet, three at the front and two at the back, with short but sharp talons. And, instead of tail feathers, he had an actual tail. ...of sorts. Rather, it was a single tail that split into two shortly after separating away from the posterior and resembled lion tails, but instead of tufty fur tips they were fanning feathers. He seemed to be able to use them to fly well enough, better even than a regular owl.

Then there were the noises he made, which sounded nothing at all like an Earth owl’s. They had an odd warbling to them and in general were entirely strange. And, in line with the aging thing, Jayr was speaking fluently and intelligently far sooner than any of the other kid’s Daemons in Rose’s class (not that she let her teachers be any the wiser, as he was invaluable for homework with his high intelligence). 

Despite the fact that the form of her Daemon warranted a lot of stares, Rose wasn’t too bothered by it. Jayr was attentive, curious, and always sticking his beak into things that didn’t concern him, but he was hers and seemed to take it upon himself to tutor her to the best of his ability and watch over her with such a serious regard for his responsibilities that it near reduced Jackie’s Jack Russell Terrier Daemon Perdido to tears of laughter when he took it upon himself one morning to teach a five year old Rose proper table etiquette. 

She went to bed one evening, Jayr perched as usual on the headboard of her bed in vigil as he didn’t seem to require much sleep, and when she woke up he was gone.

…^…

The Doctor was well into his two hundreds when Arkytior was loomed into the House of Lungbarrow. Like him, her Daemon Mircea was an Earth creature. No one else understood them, and after being relentlessly teased the Doctor decided he wanted a better life for Arkytior than he had had growing up. He suggested they go to Earth to search for their soulmates together, and she agreed. 

Of course, the Doctor hadn’t passed his pilot’s test and it took them a while to actually get to their destination. To avoid any awkwardness, Arkytior took the name Susan and referred to him as her grandfather. Despite the fact that they were in reality third cousins twice removed or some such ridiculousness, the disparity in the appearance of their ages made it the best choice.

Ian and Barbara were well-matched for each other. His Daemon was a headstrong but quiet rich brown Manx cat, her Daemon an active and good-natured tabby Tom. They got on well with Susan’s half-grown English Foxhound, but the Doctor kept Aive with him at all times. Part of him was (admittedly) irrationally worried that the other Daemons would hurt her, and the other part was afraid they’d make fun of her. All he’d ever heard from his family and peers was that she was small and helpless, just like his soulmate would be, and it always seemed to make her so sad that he’d taken to hiding her in his robes when he was at the Academy. 

He needn’t have worried, though. 

“Oh, what’s this?” Barbara gasped, reaching down to gently fondle Aive’s ears before abruptly remembering the taboo against touching another person’s Daemon and simply cooing at the tiny wolf pup instead. “Ian, come look! Isn’t she precious?”

“That she is,” Ian agreed, smiling at the happy little thing as it yipped up at them. He looked up at the Doctor hovering tensely in the doorway to the console room and nodded toward the pup. “She’s rather... small.” 

“My soulmate and I have... rather disproportionate lifespans,” the Doctor admitted gruffly. Aive tilted her head to the side and trotted over to tug on his trousers with her teeth, causing him to huff fondly before picking her squirming form up and holding her in his arms. She wiggled free and climbed up to balance on his shoulders, tail wagging frantically, and Ian chuckled. “As a result my Daemon will age much more slowly than others’ because it will be far longer for _me_ before meeting _her_ than it will be for _her_ to meet _me_.” He paused. “I should think her Daemon will age much faster than those around her in that regard, but for obvious reasons I won’t be sure until I meet her.”

“Why are your lifespans so different, Doctor?” Barbara asked. His jaw set. 

“Susan and I come from a planet called Gallifrey, in the constellation of Kasterborous on the other side of the galaxy all four of us call home. My species are called Gallifreyans, Barbara, and I have the added status of being a Time Lord. I myself am currently approaching my four hundredth birthday, and Susan will soon be two hundred.”

The two companions gaped at him but found no words, and muttering in Gallifreyan under his breath the Doctor shifted his balance so that Aive tumbled into his arms before carrying her to his room. 

“What was that about?” She pouted in her childish voice once he’d dropped her on the bed. “They were nice.” 

“I don’t like to talk about such things,” he said shortly, going over to his desk and rifling through the odds and ends he’d collected on his travels for the bag of sweets he’d recently developed a fondness for after spending time on Earth. “Jelly Baby?”

Aive didn’t reply immediately and he frowned. She loved the things with almost as much enthusiasm as he did, so he turned to look at her and his hearts broke a little. 

“Aive?”

“I embarrass you,” she murmured, ears drooping as she dejectedly rested her muzzle on her front paws. 

“No, no never,” the Doctor gasped, practically leaping across the room to sit beside her on the bed. 

“You do though,” she sniffled. He sighed, gathering her into his arms and hugging her close to his chest before flopping backward onto the bed. She snuggled close to the sound of his beating hearts and nuzzled at the bottom of his chin.

“I don’t, Aive. I just... I don’t like people reminding me that I will have so little time to spend with my soulmate, and that it will be a long, long while before I meet her.” 

“But she’ll be your best friend,” Aive murmured, confused. “Why is that sad?” The Doctor smiled ruefully at that. The irony of the fact that his Daemon was too young to understand romantic love in its complexity while he ached for it was not lost on him. 

…^…

“Why does she have to leave, Theta?” Aive whimpered, pawing at his leg where he stood at the open doors of the TARDIS. 

“She found her soulmate, Aive,” the Doctor explained calmly. Susan was chatting animatedly with David Campbell, the Gallifreyan Cobblemouse flitting happily about her head a clearer indication of their match if ever there was one, and smiled when she looked back at him and grinned. “I’ll admit I’m sad to see her go, but this is why we left in the first place. We both knew that, someday, our travels together would end.”

“But why so soon?” The pup whined. She protested mightily when he picked her up and squirmed until she was able to see his face. Daemon bond or no, he was hard to read sometimes. 

“Because this is when she was meant to meet him,” he replied easily, suddenly very sad as the comparison of having to explain something to a small child was a little too close to the mark to let him ignore it. 

Susan walked over, her hand in David’s, and only let go long enough to throw her arms around the Doctor’s neck.

“I’ll miss you grandfather,” she murmured. The Doctor chuckled softly into her neck.

“And I you, Susan. I couldn’t ask for a better young woman to be my adoptive granddaughter than you.” He pulled slightly away. “Now, take care. Remember that you have the TARDIS communications information, don’t hesitate to call should you need me. And good luck.” 

Ben and Polly fought like cats and dogs despite (or because of) the attraction that clearly went both ways. Go figure, seeing as that was what their Daemons were. Whereas Aive had liked Ian and Barbara’s Daemons, she rather disliked these two new ones. They were constantly snapping at one another and chasing one another around - the Doctor liked to snicker and call it spring fever - and as a result Aive’s tiny form had been trampled more than a few times. She had taken to hiding out in the Doctor’s bedroom unless she knew the others weren’t about, And there was something in the way she conducted herself that worried him a little. Not for her, but for his soulmate. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but something was... not wrong, but concerning. 

Funny how that was the last thing he thought about before he regenerated, really. Part of him was terrified that he’d wake up from it with a completely new Daemon because he had a new soulmate despite the fact that he’d been taught from a young age that never happened, and the other part was worried that his soulmate might feel the same way. Would she know something had happened? 

…^…

It was rather disconcerting to go to sleep one night with your alien owl perched above your bed and to wake up in the morning with an alien mouse curled up asleep on your pillow. Rose stared at the tiny creature, not entirely sure what to make of it, before noticing that Jayr was nowhere to be seen. At least... 

Instinctively, she knew this strange mouse was her Daemon. She couldn’t fathom why he had changed his shape when it had been consistent for the past five years, but he had. So, she did the only logical thing she could think of in the situation. She poked him. 

Jayr stirred immediately, uncurling a small body and yawning. He blinked open a pair of warm blue eyes and smiled as best a mouse could, long whiskers twitching as he sniffed at the air. His body shape certainly appeared mouselike aside from two oddities; the ears were long like a rabbit’s and extremely tufty, and the tail was furred with a feathered fluffy tip that swished through the air like an extremely fancy dusting wand. Soft, short scarlet fur covered his body and a streak of silver beginning in between his shoulder blades thickened along his back before it got to the tail, where it tapered off. There were silver rings near the tip though, which was also silver. 

The silver appeared to be glowing faintly with its own light.

“What happened?” Rose asked. Jayr shrugged his tiny little mouse shoulders and stood, taking the time to acclimate to his new body. 

“Regeneration,” he explained after a few moments. Even his voice sounded different than it had before. “It’s something your soulmate’s species can do where, if they’re dying, they turn into a new person. Same memories, same core beliefs and thoughts and feelings, but a new body and personality. I guess I get that too.”

“These Time Lords you talked about a tiny bit are weird,” Rose muttered. Her eyes then widened. “Wait. Dying? Is he okay?” Jayr fixed her with a withering look, which she returned full force, and rolled his eyes. 

“Obviously he was badly hurt, otherwise I wouldn’t have changed, but I didn’t feel anything sever.” It was a lot for a five year old to take in, but Rose struggled on valiantly.

“O _kay_... can you change back?”

“No, sorry.” A look of worry crossed the creature’s face and he hunched. “Why, do you not want me to be your Daemon anymore?”

“That’s not what I was askin’ about,” she said quickly. “I’m jus’ curious. ‘S not every day you wake up and your Daemon completely changed while you were sleeping.” 

“Rose, sweetheart? What are you doing up so early?” Jackie asked with a yawn, opening the door of her daughter’s bedroom. Perdido was right on her heels; he blinked once before leaping onto the end of the bed and stretching forward to touch noses with Jayr. 

“How can you be the same?” Perdido demanded. “You look nothing like you did before!” 

“Wait, _that’s_ Jayr!?” Jackie yelped. She hadn’t fully believed her daughter’s Daemon - and thus soulmate - was an alien, but that was pretty indisputable proof. The sooty owl (looking thing) had been replaced by a tiny mouse with an odd tail, strange fur color, and glowing silver stripes with odd ears. 

“Yep,” Rose replied promptly, sitting up in bed and instinctively holding out her hand. Jayr chirped appreciatively and darted up her arm to sit on her shoulder, long whiskers tickling the outer shell of her ear, and she giggled. Jackie raised an eyebrow.

“Well, if you’re okay with it then I guess I can be too...” she murmured, wide eyes fixed on the odd little (and obviously alien) mouse. Perdido huffed softly, winding around her legs, and she gathered strength from the reassuring contact. 

He was the only thing she had left of Pete; the old adage about those you loved never truly leaving you because you carried a part of them inside of you was entirely true. Likewise, the part of her that belonged to him had died when he did, disappearing in a puff of smoke as she cried out and broke Jackie along with her. Now, Perdido was doing his best to raise Rose with her as he could. Daemons as a general rule only ever spoke with the person whose soul they were a manifestation of or that person’s soulmate, but ever since Pete had died Perdido would speak directly to Rose and talk with her in an attempt to fill in the gap. So, the reassurance that he recognized Jayr was enough for Jackie to be convinced.

“What day is it?” Rose asked. Jackie made an effort to smile. 

“Saturday, love. You should get back to sleep, and then we’ll do a proper fry-up all right?”

“Kay,” the young girl murmured as she snuggled back into the pillows. Jayr chirped and settled into the crook of her neck and shoulder, content. Jackie shook her head at the pair of them before softly closing the door behind her. Perdido jumped onto the couch and eyed her critically. 

“You’re not at all concerned, are you?” She asked after a few moments. His head tilted in the classic terrier way before he smiled at her. Well, smiled as a dog could. 

“She’s happy. Why can’t her soulmate be someone from another planet?”

“It’s not the alien thing that worries me,” Jackie sighed, sitting next to her Daemon and ruffling the fur between his ears. “I’ve more or less come to terms with that over the last five years. No, what concerns me is this whole changing Daemons thing. What could cause that to happen, eh?”

“It’s okay to worry about her,” Perdido soothed, placing a comforting paw on her knee and leaving it there. “Just don’t make her anxious over something that might not even be a big deal.”

The look she gave him was well-deserved; the incredulity was a matter of due course after a statement like that. He merely shrugged and licked one of his paws. 

…^…

The Doctor was interrupted in his practice of the recorder one day when a high-pitched wailing started up in the TARDIS, and abruptly he stopped playing to race through the corridors and find the source of the noise. What he found brought him up short, and he simply stood in the doorway of his workshop for a few moments. 

“...Are you... singing along?” He asked incredulously. Aive, who had her head tipped all the way up and her mouth open in a pre-adolescent howl, nodded happily as her tail whipped back and forth. “Oh. You like singing, do you?”

“I think _she_ does,” Aive explained. “So I do too.” 

“She does?” He whispered, sitting down on the floor cross-legged beside his Daemon, whose entire body wiggled with suppressed energy as she bounced on her toes. “What else does she like?” 

“Uh... Ooh! Gymnastics, and rain, and-“

Jamie found them later on, still on the floor, but Aive was asleep in the Doctor’s arms and he was gently humming to her. The Scot smiled and kept walking past the open door, his own Daemon nowhere to be found. Then again, the magnificent beastie _was_ quite large. He’d never really understood the significance behind having a unicorn as his Daemon before being told that it was Scotland’s national animal, much like England’s roaring lion or Wales’ Dragon. Zoe had already teased him about it, joking that his soulmate was his homeland, but he found that he rather enjoyed the banter. Unlike Victoria, who he had had an... interest in, Zoe was more like the annoying sister role. 

Speaking of which, she was in the library when he got there gently stroking the fur of her mongoose Daemon with absent abandon. 

“So, where are we going?” She asked, not looking up from her book. Jamie rolled his eyes.

“The wee lass’s all washed out,” he explained. Zoe did glance up at that, smiling softly as she nodded. Further explanation wasn’t required; Aive was easily the smallest and youngest-acting thing on board the ship. “The Doctor’ll probably want to take us somewhere once she’s awake.”

“They’re rather adorable together don’t you think?”

“I suppose...”

“What- oh, Jamie. Don’t you see? The disparity of their lifespans isn’t a tragedy. It simply is. No matter how limited the amount of time they’ll eventually have together, they _will_ have it. Isn’t that enough?”

“You weren’t there when Victoria left,” Jamie snapped. “Or Ben and Polly. He’s always so _lonely_ , Zoe. We’ll only be a small part of his long life, for such a short time he can call us his friends, and then whether by our own volition or not we’ll leave someday. And he’ll be alone again, reminded of how lonely he’ll always be because she isn’t here and Aive is visible proof that she won’t be here for long when she eventually does show up.”

“I hadn’t thought of it like that before,” Zoe mumbled, crestfallen on the Doctor’s behalf. Jamie nodded, sadness etching into his features as he slumped into a chair and gazed into the fireplace. 

…^…

The War Zones were unlike anything the Doctor had ever seen before, and despite the fact that he knew Aive was practically suffocating in his coat he kept her pressed close to his chest as much of the time as he could. She was so small, so bright and curious, and this was war. War, in its most brutal and destructive forms represented across multiple points in time in history. 

When it was all said and done and he stood before the Time Lords, she was pressed against his legs growling at everything in sight, her little hackles and fangs bared, defiant to the universe on his behalf.

…^…

This new version of Jayr was, in a word, different. Neither good nor bad, just different. Whereas his first form was mischievous with a serious regard toward furthering her education, the second was flighty and had a bad tendency of getting into trouble when he wasn’t even looking for it. Where before he liked to soar near her as she practiced her gymnastics at the Jericho Street Center, now he preferred to rifle aimlessly around the discarded bags of the other children to indulge his insatiable curiosity. Oftentimes this ended with him being chased by far bigger and more predatory Daemons protecting their owners’ items, but one thing everyone had learned very quickly was what the bioluminescent stripes were for.

They would brighten unpredictably when Jayr felt threatened, bright enough that it was a tiny flash of searing light that required one to reflexively shut their eyes when it happened, and Rose couldn’t help but sigh when several of her teammates had stopped to stare at the strange Daemon with almost fearful intrigue.

“I make things difficult for you, don’t I?” Jayr asked quietly one afternoon walking home from practice. Rose had just turned seven the month before; this would be her last year on the team unless her mum enrolled her for the next group.

“Yes,” Rose said without hesitation, offering him a Jelly Baby from where he was perched on her shoulder. He grabbed at it with his tiny paws and nibbled enthusiastically. “Always have, always will. I’m guessing that’s a defining trait my soulmate has, Huh?”

“Unfortunately, from what I can tell, he has a talent for making life difficult for _everyone_ including himself simply by existing,” Jayr sighed. He suddenly stiffened. “Rose?”

“Hmm?”

“I think, I think it’s happening again.”

“What is?” She gaped at him as he practically threw himself off her shoulder and landed on the gritty cement of an alley opening, entire body rigid and shining with golden light. “You’re changing again- he’s changing again?” 

“Yes!” Jayr squeaked. Rose bit her lip, eyeing her surroundings uneasily. There were some mean girls from her school looking at her and whispering, snickering more like, but for the most part the streets seemed clear. Quickly, she nudged her Daemon into the alley with the toe of her foot and peered back out.

“Does it hurt?” She asked softly. He nodded. 

“Hey Tyler,” a voice said behind her. Rose gasped as she whirled around and came face to face with the other girls. “What’s the matter? I thought we were friends.”

“We have very different ideas of what that means,” Rose muttered. She flinched as one of the girls’ dog Daemons snapped at her. “Leave me alone, okay?”

“Or what?” Mean Girl #2 taunted. “Your mouse’ll tickle my nose off?”

“Something like that,” Jayr growled from behind Rose. The girls went pale as ghosts and screamed before running off; frowning Rose turned around and was suddenly face to face with a massive and full-grown white lion. Jayr smiled at her, purring as she hesitantly sank her fingers into his thick mane, and blinked slowly with mischievous rich blue eyes. 

“This is... different,” Rose said quietly, not knowing exactly what to say otherwise. Jayr chuffed, a massive pink tongue flicking out to lick her nose, and she laughed. “Why’re you an Earth animal all of a sudden?” 

“I think he got mad at Gallifrey for some reason,” Jayr replied thoughtfully. “And Earth is your home, so it’s sort of his home now too.” 

“Mm... I like that,” Rose decided. She shrieked with delight as he hunched down and nudged her with his snout, sending her sprawling onto his back until she was seated just behind his shoulders. She gripped his mane and leaned forward as his tail twitched, and suddenly he was off racing through London proper back toward the Powell Estates. Startled people jumped out of their way, staring after the large feline with the seven year old girl on his back in shock.

“You ever seen the like?” One man murmured. 

“Never,” a woman fervently replied. 

Jackie let out a shriek when she saw Jayr, which was to be expected, because the idea of a Daemon that big in the tiny little flat they had was not at all a good one. On the other hand, she didn’t have to worry about anyone trying to attack her little girl for the foreseeable future. Jayr was also very congenial about the whole thing. He somehow, after half a day of searching, managed to find a spot to lay in the hallway where he would be least bother to anyone but was still in the middle of things, and he stuck to it unless it was a movie night, in which instance he would sit in front of the tv with Rose using him as a cushion.

While his first form had been good-natured but serious and his second had been - well, a bit of a Bedouin really - his latest form had a brisk manner and dry sense of humor. He was especially keen to help Rose with her homework and she often went to the park when school was out to let him have space to run and jump. Very active, this one. But in a productive sort of way. 

And, though Jackie was never to know this, the pair once took a daytime holiday to the country just outside of London proper. Rose had ridden on Jayr’s back and they had sped easily to freedom to lark about for a while. Mickey had wanted to come too, his Morgan Horse Daemon Peseshet just the right size for him to ride at present but not as fast as Jayr, and it took them a while to catch up. 

Out in the open space Mickey and Peseshet played, practicing jumps and turns. Rose laid out on the grass next to Jayr, who was more than happy to soak up the sun, and played with the fur in his mane. He was soon purring at her attentions. 

“You’re just a great big house cat,” Rose teased. Jayr opened one eye to a blue slit before closing it again.

“My dear girl, I can assure you I am far superior to a simple _house cat_ ,” he scoffed. “I could _eat_ a house cat if the fancy struck me.”

“Yeah, but you wouldn’t.”

“Of course not. But I _could_.” His purring intensified as she went for his stomach, and he rolled onto his back to give her better access. “If I wished.”

“You’re completely hopeless,” Rose sighed fondly.

…^…

A man, who could become an entirely new person, yet keep the same Daemon? It sounded implausible, but there it was. The fact of the matter was that Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart, working with U.N.I.T., had been about to leave the mysterious stranger before he’d seen the young wolf daemon laying anxiously on the end of the bed at the hospital.

“Brigadier?” She called, head lifting and drooped ears perking. He couldn’t help but smile as her little tail started to wag at the prospect of a familiar friend. His own Daemon Safya chuffed as she went over and licked the pup between the ears; despite being a Shiba Inu she was larger than the Doctor’s Daemon and after a few moments Alistair felt pride well in his chest as it became obvious that Safya was mothering Aive. 

“Aive. What happened to the Doctor?”

“The Time Lords regenerated him because he broke their rules, and then they left him here,” she replied readily. Liz Shaw blinked at that in surprise; most Daemons didn’t speak to anyone other than their person and soulmate. As if sensing her thoughts the Brigadier turned to her with an explanation.

“When it comes to the Doctor, having a Daemon that can help explain things to people is a good idea. Aive will talk to anyone that she knows the Doctor trusts as an ally simply because she can best help him that way.” He eyed the unconscious and unfamiliar man on the hospital bed. “Case in point.” 

U.N.I.T. didn’t really know what to make of their scientific advisor on a good day, but bad days it was near impossible to figure out what was going on inside his head. Aive was the only indicator of his emotional state, so when she hovered around him the entire day the Brigadier usually knew he needed to find something interesting to keep the Time Lord from getting bored. It was all about reading the signs.

Bessie was a bright spot in an otherwise dreary day to day agenda. Without the TARDIS he was limited to Earth, but...

Well. Aive certainly seemed to love sticking her head out of the side of the car when the top was down and letting her tongue flap in the wind. She also liked laying on the counters and tables while he was conducting experiments, holding his sonic screwdriver in her mouth and being immensely careful with empty test tubes. Regardless of the fact that she had passed the ‘egg test,’ there was no way he would have her hold sealed chemicals in fragile glass containers in her mouth. He wasn’t crazy. 

...Especially. 

It was on one particular afternoon that he and Jo were out in London that they stopped to get fish and chips, and that was when the Doctor discovered quite by accident that his soulmate (and thus his Daemon) was willing to go through just about anything for chips. Specifically salty, hot out of the fryer golden crunchy-on-the-outside light and soft-on-the-inside strips of pure potato goodness. 

Nearly climbed his arm to get at the basket, really. Aive ended up sitting on his shoulder, a spot she had once been able to fit on with little effort, and he wasn’t sure whether it made him happy or sad that she was getting a little too big to do that anymore. After five minutes of her squirming around and accidentally smacking him in the face with her tail trying to get comfortable in the narrow fit, he decided glad was the correct answer. 

She was also big enough now that running into the Master’s full-grown Gallifreyan approximation of a snake Daemon wasn’t as terrifying a thing as it might have been when she was younger. Instead of being bitten and squeezed, the two quarreling Time Lords turned around at just the right moment in their sword fight to see her proudly trot into the room with the poor thing wriggling uselessly in her firm, viselike jaws. 

The Master had let out an enraged shout at that, lunging forward, and the Doctor had been able to easily trip him up and lock him back into his cell. 

…^…

Rose was nine when Jayr changed into a March Hare, his cobalt blue eyes almost manic to match the seemingly boundless energy coursing through his rich brown body. She’d never deny that she missed her lion when asked, but she also missed her alien mouse and alien owl. That didn’t mean she loved the new form any less, it was simply different and a present ever-altering feature of her life. 

Jackie liked the Hare much better in some ways and much less in others. He was constantly upending things, springing off of furniture at unpredictable moments, and in general was a raging ball of chaos. He was more absent-minded too, only half-listening to anything around him and as a result driving her nearly spare when she’d say one thing and then he’d repeat it genuinely thinking it had come to him on his own. Despite his near-obsession with them this time around, both Tylers thought it wise to withhold the Jelly Babies from him as much as possible. 

Jayr loved getting into Nana Prentice’s knitting too, to the point where she made him a scarf that was far too long and he tripped over it constantly, but you’d never seen a happier animal. He was also able to sleep on her bed again, and often-times Rose would end up nudging him onto her nightstand or just straight onto the floor because his left leg had a bad habit of twitching in his sleep and catching her in the ribs and spine otherwise. 

He was like that for a long time, really. So much so that he’d managed to settle down a bit by virtue of getting entirely used to how he was and all that could be done while that way. 

…^…

Sarah hadn’t really understood why the Doctor was so overprotective of his Daemon when they’d first met, but once she realized that the tiny innocent-looking fluff ball was in fact not a dog but a pre-adolescent wolf she got it. The Daemon had fierce protective instincts and a penchant for getting herself into trouble, and accidentally shredding the maroon-themed scarf because she coincidentally happened to favor the classic seven-color striped one was just the tip of the iceberg. 

Leela had been more understanding, but she’d had the unique opportunity to see the cross-species soulmate match from the opposite side of the spectrum than the Doctor had. Her Daemon was a Horse-Cat, large and intimidating but gentle to its owners, and had undergone at least three transformations along the way. Her soulmate was a Time Lord, and they both appreciated catching a glimpse of the other side. 

He couldn’t help but wonder what his past three forms had taken in his Daemon, what his current one did, if she liked one more than another. Leela had never considered that her Daemon would age more slowly to accommodate the disparity in her and her soulmate’s lifespans. 

It was... informative.

And then there was Romana. She’d snickered at his very human Daemon (and thus human soulmate) upon seeing Aive for the first time, and despite the fact that the White Guardian had sent her to help him collect the Key to Time the Doctor was only seconds away from throwing her out the doors of his TARDIS when Aive had slunk deeper into the ship dejectedly. 

It wasn’t until after she’d regenerated that she finally apologized, and while the Doctor was able to accept that Aive had merely nodded and abruptly left the room. 

The two Time Lords exchanged a glance.

“I really am sorry,” Romana murmured softly, brushing her blonde hair away from her face worriedly. The Doctor sighed, standing to follow his Daemon out of the library.

“It wasn’t your fault,” he replied. “Well, it was. But her reaction has nothing to do with you, I’m afraid. Entirely deep-seated concerns she’s had for a long while. I’d better go see what’s bothering her.”

“Sorry,” Romana called after him. He ignored her in favor of tracking his Daemon, not at all surprised to find her in their bedroom. 

She was standing in front of the floor-length mirror raised up onto her hind feet, attempting to make herself as tall as possible, and the whimper she let out when she over-balanced broke his hearts. Habitually, he picked her up and set her on the bed. 

“Don’t do that!” She spat. He blinked, surprised at the pain in that single sentence, and took a step backward.

“Why not? I’ve always done that.” Aive huffed, toeing at the duvet with her right forepaw and avoiding his gaze.

“I’m not supposed to still be small enough for you to do that,” she murmured unhappily. 

“Yes you are,” he sighed, sitting on the bed and frowning when she flinched away from him, refusing to be comforted. 

“No, I’m not. I should be big, full-grown. Sarah mistook me for some sort of _Terrier_ before realizing I wasn’t an adult yet, and Leela asked what was wrong with me. Alistair’s Safya kept _mothering_ me. I’m older than her! I don’t _need_ to be mothered!”

“Aive-“

“I _hate_ being so little!” She leapt off the bed and raced out of the room, leaving him sitting shocked staring after her.

It was a long time before he finally found her again, this time underneath some maintenance pipes undoubtedly where she was hoping he wouldn’t be able to get at her. The Doctor said nothing, merely sat with his back to her to give her some privacy as she seemed to need it. After a few moments she finally spoke.

“It’s not fair,” she whined. “Romana was right. I’m pathetic.”

“Romana herself admitted she was wrong,” the Doctor reminded her gently but firmly. “You’re not pathetic. You’re just unique.”

“Which is another way of saying I’m weird,” Aive huffed. He opened his mouth to answer but then closed it with a snap, thinking through certain things for a few moments before replying. 

“...That’s cheating,” she muttered as she crawled out from under the pipes. He smiled. 

…^…

“You’re all leg,” the Doctor huffed. Aive grumbled something unintelligible as she shifted on his chest, lanky adolescent limbs digging into his ribs. She’d finally had a growth spurt, entering her ‘teen years’ as it were, and she barely fit in her accustomed sleeping spot anymore. “Ow.” 

“I’d rethink the lapdog idea,” Tegan laughed as she walked into the library with Adric and Nyssa in tow. The Doctor glanced over at them from where he was pinned to the couch, his book just out of reach of his grasp, as he attempted to not disturb his napping Daemon. 

“No, really?” He asked sarcastically. “The thought had never crossed my mind.” Aive muttered something about somebody named Mickey in her sleep being a ‘stupid lump’ and he grinned. 

“Who’s Mickey?” Adric asked curiously.

“Her best friend, from what I can gather,” the Doctor explained unconcernedly. “He gets a lot of sibling abuse, apparently, from my soulmate.” He sighed melodramatically. “Poor bloke.”

“I sort of feel bad for you once you meet her,” Nyssa commented with a raised eyebrow. She received a shrug in response.

“But we’ll be together, all that matters. And as for the lapdog problem Tegan, she can’t fall asleep without the sound of my hearts anymore. She’s heard it since she was a pup, and it means safety to her.”

“Yeah, I wonder why you did _that_ ,” the Australian snorted. The Doctor raised a tawny eyebrow; it passed into his shaggy blond bangs and disappeared. “Fine, then. Feign ignorance. I just so happen to know that Daemons and their people share memories through the subconscious and dreams, and that you’ve been trying to condition your soulmate the entire time to think of your heartbeat as comforting when she actually gets here.”

“I have two hearts, Tegan,” the Time Lord murmured softly. “My heartsbeat doesn’t sound anything like a human’s. The hope is that, by getting Aive accustomed to it, my soulmate won’t be put off by it.”

“...Oh.” 

He didn’t know how long he spent weeping in the privacy of his bedroom, the shards of a star for mathematical excellence clutched in his fingers until the edges made him bleed, his face pressed into honey gold fur as Aive gently nuzzled at his temples and licked his hair away from his eyes...

...But it was a long, long while.

…^…

Soft whimpering drew Rose out of a deep and troubled sleep. Connected to her Daemon, the things she had seen were reflected to Rose only in dreams. While every single one was a mad adventure of some sort - and while her mother shook her head at that Rose couldn’t be happier catching glimpses of far-off worlds and times both past, present, and future - but lately they had been sad. Difficult.

Something bad had happened, she could tell. Just as her sleep was interrupted by nightmares, so too was Jayr affected by her soulmate’s emotional state. 

Humming softly in light, encouraging tones, Rose gently extracted herself from her Daemon’s side to tug him into her lap. Jayr whimpered again and buried his muzzle into her stomach seeking comfort as she stroked his silky, floppy ears. 

He was a Golden Retriever this time around. Sandy blond and slightly shaggy fur, soft sky blue eyes, and a gentle and enthusiastic attitude toward practically everything that came his way. The pinnacle of sensitive, really, though he played it off very well pretending otherwise and convincing all but her. Right now he was doing the closest approximation a dog could have of a person crying, and it tore at her heart to see him that way. 

She might have been fourteen and some change, but she knew enough hardship from a life on the Estates to recognize when someone had been dealt a particularly bad hand at fate.

“What now?” She murmured.

“She left,” Jayr shuddered out, voice quivering. “No more Brave Heart. Just... gone. Ran.”

“One of his friends?” A tense nod. “Oh, come here, love.” She frowned slightly, remembering something he’d mentioned once. “D’you think- I mean, I know you said it was just Time Lords could do it, and right now your form is an Earth animal, but... if I were to put my fingers on your temples, could I say something telepathically?” 

Jayr’s entire body stiffened before he let out a soft sigh, feathery tail slowly dragging across her duvet.

“Worth a try,” he whispered. “Anything is better than this.” 

“Okay.” Rose gently pressed her fingers against Jayr’s temples, closing her eyes and concentrating. 

Far off in space, millenia away in time, the Doctor stiffened mid-ramble as he and his companions walked through a museum. Aive let out a soft, startled bark, and Peri and Erimem eyed him curiously. The former’s Daemon was napping in her pocket, the latter’s cat Antranak contentedly resting on her shoulders. 

“Doctor, what is it?” Peri asked, concerned. He made a sudden effort to smile, shooed them away to explore as quickly as possible, and then sat on the nearest bench with Aive’s head resting in his lap. Hesitantly, he lifted shaking hands to settle his fingers against her temples just under her velvet satellite dish-like ears. 

_They met on a hazy plane of undefined existence due to a stretched and rather bad connection, really. Neither could see, nor hear. He could have wept when he sensed the telepathic equivalent of a hand slipping into his, though, and he made the telepathic equivalent gesture of squeezing her fingers._

_She squeezed back._

They fell into a habit after that. Whenever one was having a hard time of it, they would make telepathic contact seeking one another’s comfort. Definition remained elusive and stubbornly they remained far apart, but in their little connection they could let everything fall away for a few brief moments before Rose grew too tired to keep the link going. She wasn’t telepathic, after all, and the distance was pretty taxing.

…^…

The Doctor was wearing a stolen prop from the musical _Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat_ with a cat pin stuck to the lapel the next time he saw the Brigadier. He had landed on Lanyon Moor with his latest companion Evelyn Smythe, a wonderful older woman who had quite literally bribed her way aboard by offering to bake him one of her famous chocolate cakes, and by accident they had chanced across his old friend in the process. 

“My word, she’s gotten big,” Alistair commented with a raised eyebrow. Aive’s tail wagged happily as she nodded smugly and trotted off. He looked back at the Doctor. “Last time I saw her her head only just came past your knee. She’s at your hip.”

“Mostly leg,” the Doctor laughed. “Mostly leg. But I shouldn’t wonder if she’ll grow into them at some point. She’s still in that awkward adolescent phase at present.” His expression grew thoughtful. “Alistair, I wonder if you’d do me a favor?”

“Ask and I’ll see.” 

“My soulmate. Could you be on the lookout for her? She was born just a few years ago as far as I can guess, and lives in a less affluent area of London. I don’t know much more than that, but I’ll warrant she’ll have had a Daemon that is not only adult beyond her years but also in the habit of changing his form. I just... if anyone were to find out that she was my soulmate, I worry what might happen to her.”

“I’ll keep an eye out,” Alistair said with a smile. “Be aware I won’t be telling you anything about her, but I _will_ keep tabs.”

“Thank you,” the Doctor sighed, the tension leaving his body in a noticeable slumping of his shoulders. 

…^…

Chaos, that’s what it was. Pure chaos had descended upon the Tyler flat. 

Rose, barely at sixteen years old, merely sat with her chin propped on her hand as she watched her mother chase her bright-plumaged Macaw Parrot around the flat with a fly swatter.

Jayr perched on a shelf too high for her to reach, staring down at her with imperious blue eyes, and Rose sighed as the shouting match commenced. Jackie would hurl abuse, he would copy her and match her voice perfectly so that it sounded like there was an echo. And so the cycle would continue.

He was soft and patient with her, she knew. She was his tender spot and she suspected her soulmate would be wrapped around her finger in his current incarnation, the way Jayr pandered to her. That was what lay underneath, the soft vulnerability. The part only she was allowed to see. 

Everyone saw a boastful show-off who loved the sound of his own voice. Which, Rose admitted, was true to a certain extent, but wasn’t that accurate for everybody? Except hermits. Or monks. Maybe. 

Ah, well. Let the show go on. Life was a circus, her Daemon and her mum the performers, and she’d just made popcorn. Perdido, who was sitting by her side, seemed equally content to be an impartial observer. 

She should have known better than to suggest the four of them play Monopoly. 

…^…

“Why did you do that?” Aive asked quietly. The Doctor shrugged, tossing his Panama hat across the room to settle perfectly on the jumbled desk. 

“I had to.”

“No, you didn’t.” He sighed, raising an eyebrow as he looked down his nose at his soulmate’s Daemon. 

“Oh, really?” He asked, rolling the ‘r’ with reckless abandon. Aive slowly stood on the bed - making her taller than him, she was almost fully grown now besides and quite intimidating-looking - and glared at him. 

“Ace thinks the world of you,” she snarled, and he took a step back when her hackles started to rise. “ _I_ think the world of _her_. Do the math.” 

“I had to destroy her faith in me, Fenric was using it against-“

“I don’t care that you did it!” Aive shouted. “I care that you’re trying to justify it! You can’t! So get over it, get over yourself, and _go and apologize to her_.” The Doctor blinked, the mask falling away. 

“Aive, I never wanted... I didn’t...”

“Why do you try to hide from me?” She whispered. “I see you anyway.”

“I don’t hide from _you_ ,” he countered, looking away. “I hide from myself.” 

“Don’t.” He finally looked up at that, confused, and found her leaning toward him. When she had his attention she touched their noses together and he sighed. 

“Aive, I’ve got darkn-“

“So have I. And you still love _me_ unconditionally, so why is it so hard to believe I can’t feel the same about you?” 

“You just- you’re quoting me now!” He protested. She chuckled. 

“So I am. Now, go apologize. Then you should talk to your soulmate.” 

…^… 

Jayr was an Arctic Fox wearing its rich brown summer coat. Intelligent blue eyes that saw far too much of anything. Rose was seventeen, seventeen and impatient to meet her soulmate. Jimmy Stone was twenty-four and looking for a one night stand in any way he could. 

Alistair was well-retired and happened to have a hidden pistol in his walking cane. Before Jimmy knew what was happening he had a small revolver pressed against his forehead.

“Think very, _very_ carefully about what you want to do here,” Alistair threatened. 

“Mate, she couldn’t do better!” Jimmy barked. He went deathly pale as the hammer clicked back. 

“Seeing as her soulmate is one of my most valued friends I highly doubt that. Now get out of here. And if I ever see you sniffing after her again, rest assured I will _hunt you_ to the ends of the Earth.”

“Y-yes sir,” Jimmy stuttered before tripping over himself in his haste to get away. Alistair turned and smiled at Rose as he reassembled his walking cane before leaning on it. 

“I imagine you have many questions?”

“Well- yeah,” she admitted. Jayr slowly approached and sat in front of her feet, staring up at the older man with a calculating expression, and Alistair rolled his eyes. 

“It speaks volumes that I don’t have to make a guess as to which Incarnation you’re on,” he sighed. “Seventh?”

“Well-spotted,” came the clipped reply with the rolling Scottish brogue. 

“I simply know you better than most.” He straightened and glanced around. “Shall we continue this at your flat, Miss Tyler? I’m sure your mother would want to hear what I have to say as well.”

“...Okay.” 

In the end it was much less difficult for Rose to explain the man - whose name she and Jackie soon found out was Retired Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart - who had so unexpectedly dropped into their lives. He took her home, told Jackie what had happened, and had stayed for tea. He’d then talked at length about Rose’s soulmate (or rather the things he was allowed to confirm) and had then left early in the morning. 

Rose was left staring at the six pictures she’d been handed of his past Incarnations, though not his current one. The logic, Alistair had said, was that she would never meet those men unless she traveled through time. Delicately, her fingers brushed each picture. 

The stern older gentleman with the mischievous blue-hazel eyes. The interstellar street musician with the recorder. The Scientist, caught mid-experiment gone wrong with the velvet smoking jacket. The Cheshire Cat grin and ridiculous scarf. The Cricketer with the Celery. The musical theatre costume design escapee. 

“Wonder what yours looks like,” she mused as she glanced over at Jayr, who was curled on the end of the tattered couch watching her silently. “You’re a bit broody.”

“I hide it with my charm and bad delivery of metaphors,” he quipped amusedly, rolling lazily onto his side so that his head was in her lap and his magnificent fox tail was hanging off the side of the furniture. 

Needless to say, neither one of them knew what to make of the Question Mark Motif™️ That they’d got in the mail to add to the collection when Jayr had changed again. 

…^…

After a rather unfortunate stint in San Francisco involving amnesia, the Master, and Aive getting completely soaked in the exploding foam of a champagne bottle they were back in the TARDIS alone. Time passed, and Charley came aboard. She’d seemed to be hoping for something he hadn’t been able to give, and after a time she had left. Then Lucie, who along with her rather hot-headed Daemon was probably somewhere deep in the ship getting into trouble at present.

Soft music was playing over the gramophone as he laid back in his chair placed beside the fire in the Console Room and dozed. Or, rather, he dozed because he was warm and was trapped because Aive had laid herself atop him like a graciously soft prison as she napped. They’d finally figured out why Lucie had been placed into the Time Lord equivalent of witness protection, had figured out where the mistake had been made. 

After the abuse the poor TARDIS had had at the hands of the so-called ‘maintenance team’ it was a good idea to drift in the Time Vortex, and then after that they both agreed that they needed a pampering vacation. But now... 

“We haven’t done this in a while,” he murmured softly. 

“Tell me a story?” Aive replied sleepily. 

“Could do, but that would require getting up to go grab one.” 

“Mm. Maybe not then.”

“Maybe not.” They both let out contented sighs as they drifted in the golden haze of semi-sleep, mostly-awake, and relaxed bonelessly into the armchair. “I love this, Aive. The quiet. The two of us just... being, together. I can be alone with my thoughts but I don’t _feel_ alone.”

“If ya hadn’t shut me out in your last incarnation we coulda done it then, too,” she muttered. He winced. When she was angry with him her lower class London accent thickened, a trait he generally assumed she possessed due to his soulmate, and it was in full swing right now. Lesson learned, then; if his soulmate ever started talking like that he knew to head for the hills. 

“I said I was sorry.” 

“I can still be mad at you over it anyway.”

“Please tell me my soulmate isn’t going to be like this,” he groaned, letting his head flop back against the rest of the chair.

“Just remember the age-old saying, mate.” His brow furrowed and she snickered. “Hell hath no fury?”

“... _Oh.”_

…^…

The first inkling Rose got of something having happened was the exasperated, annoyed shriek her mum let off from the living room. It was three days before her eighteenth birthday and, while she was supposed to be dicing vegetables for the crudités in the kitchen Jackie, Perdido, and Jayr were working on rearranging the furniture for the party her Mum wanted to throw. 

“ _Again!?_ ” Jackie exclaimed. “Why, of all days, why now?”

“You could hang the tea mugs off of them if it would help with space?” An unfamiliar voice replied somewhat sheepishly. Rose blinked, her brain putting two and two together, before she walked to the door and froze. Jayr glanced at her and tilted his head slightly to the side in acknowledgement. “Hello, Rose.” 

“Hey,” Rose murmured, also tilting her head. “So...”

“Appears so. Suppose we’ll finally get to see what his past self looked like.” Bright blue eyes with the faintest of green undertones widened. “Good Lord, was I broody.” 

“Mm.” 

“Rose, what do we _do!?_ ” Jackie protested. Rose shrugged. 

“Like he said. Mug rack.” She walked around him, sizing him up, and grinned. “Stag, huh?”

“Mmhm.” He was on the smaller side but well-toned, his short pelt gleaming chestnut with a snowy white underbelly and soft dark nose. His antlers had eight points, perfectly symmetrical four on each side, and they were a polished cream color. “Verdict?”

“You’ll do,” she decided with a smile. “Now, important test, but can you get through the doors?”

“Only one way to find out.”

It took a bit of doing, but eventually they figured out a way. 

Since everyone on the Estates already knew about Rose’s odd Daemon those invited didn’t so much as blink at Jayr’s new appearance. A couple of people fawned over him but that was about it. As typically happened whenever Jackie Tyler threw a party, it went well into the evening and by that point Rose was exhausted. She escaped to the roof and sat out under the stars. Jayr, of course, was laying directly beside her. 

After a few moments of silent contemplation Rose smiled and pulled out her old battered camera, leaning against her Daemon. 

“Oh, must we?” Jayr whined good-naturedly. The protest was more for show than anything else; he understood her need to capture forever what he had once been like and appreciated the dedication and ease with which she accepted things. 

“Yes. Now smile.” 

The camera clicked, they were waiting to see the Polaroid form, and that was when he showed up.

“Rose?”

“Oh, hey Micks!” She said brightly. “Just got another one for the book. Wanna come see?”

“I wanted to ask you something, actually.” The tone was so out of character that it gave her pause, and she looked over to see him looking extremely nervous. 

“Shoot.”

“Would you, maybe, wanna go out sometime? I would’ve asked, before, but you were underage and I definitely didn’t need even the possibility of something like that being insinuated, and-“

“What, you mean like... on a date?” Rose asked blankly. Jayr stiffened, nostrils flaring slightly as he swung his majestic head around to stare intensely at her friend. Mickey flinched but nodded. “Micks. I... I can’t.” As she said it she rubbed soothing circles on her Daemon’s neck to calm him down. He’d been frightened once, when Rose had made a comment about some boy in her grade looking dishy, that she would prefer someone more normal than the man whose soul he embodied, and ever since she was highly conscious of just how insecure such things made him. The insecurity stemmed from a combination of the vast age difference, species difference, and cultural differences to coalesce into a feeling of general unworthiness when it came to her. 

“Oh. I just thought...” 

“Mickey, your parents split up because they weren’t soulmates,” she reminded him sadly. “Those relationships, they never really work out. You deserve better than that, and so do I. I think we should both wait for our soulmates, yeah? If yours is anything but perfect for you, she’ll be amazing. Because you’re amazing. And you should get to enjoy that, being close with someone that special, with yours. And I do too. ‘Kay?” 

“Yeah,” Mickey breathed. He shoved his hands in his pockets and rocked on his heels for a bit. “Mind if I join you anyways? Your mum’s started the conga line.”

“What, already?” Jayr groaned. Rose laughed and tickled at one of his ears, then nodded. Mickey brightened considerably as he sat down, Peseshet nickering softly before she trotted over and slowly laid down. Hadn’t been easy, getting a horse up the stairs, but the Estates had been built to accommodate the larger Daemons. You just had to apply for them. 

“Come on then, tell us a story,” Rose chirped. Jayr chuckled happily and started talking about a planet that had sapphire waterfalls.

…^…

Oddly enough, it wasn’t Rose who first noticed that something was wrong with her Daemon but Jackie. He was pensive, more withdrawn, and prone to sharp quips of the kind he usually made when stressed. It took three weeks of pestering once she’d told Rose, but to no avail. Then, one day, he just stopped mid-sentence. Wide, horrified eyes and head tilted slightly as if he were listening to something only he could hear. 

“It’s begun,” he whispered in a sort of reverent, terrified horror. 

“What has?” Rose asked softly. 

“The Time War.”

They rang Alistair almost immediately after, asking about a hundred questions pertaining to Daleks and Time Lords, he dutifully telling all he knew. The more he spoke the more pensive they all became, the more withdrawn Jayr was into himself. 

For the first time in the few years they’d been doing it, her soulmate didn’t answer her telepathic call. 

…^…

The universe was burning, and he was in the thick of it. Early on he’d slipped a telepathic dampener around Aive’s neck, just enough to block the transfer of images through the subconscious so that nothing trickled back to his soulmate, and he was in the process of making a second one to wear for himself. They’d barely escaped from Karn without serious injury and the Doctor just knew that his Daemon was having all sorts of terrifying nightmares of the kind he was most likely explaining to his soulmate - which also wasn’t needed. 

Battle after battle, planet after planet. Daleks and anti-time and... and then came the fall of Arcadia, and the last day. 

The Moment. 

A complicated little box that held the fate of the universe in its grasp, in his hands, and an interface so bright it obscured the woman’s voice and features. 

Gallifrey burned, and he with it.

…^…

Jackie was awoken late one evening when a high-pitched scream emanated from her nineteen year old daughter’s room, and without bothering to find her robe she rushed over. 

Jayr was hunched on the ground muttering something over and over again in pain as deep wounds sliced across his body, orange-tinged blood permanently staining the carpet. Rose was sitting straight up in bed sobbing, asking what was wrong, not knowing what to do. Blessedly, the golden light of Regeneration exploded across his body. 

For a few moments no one knew what to do. The two Tyler women stared at Rose’s unconscious Daemon in horrified shock, Perdido pacing and whimpering in the hall outside. After a few moments Jackie managed to pull herself together and went into the bathroom, reaching for the first aid kit. 

Together she and Rose cleaned the raw - though thankfully no longer bleeding - wounds on Jayr’s flanks. Rose had his head in her lap and she cried the entire time, but eventually his injuries had been irrigated and dressed and it was possible for her with Mickey’s help to very gently pick him up and move him onto the bed to sleep it off.

…^…

He hadn’t been in London that long when something happened. Something always happened, it seemed. 

This time it was Autons. He hadn’t been feeling all too great and, hoping that a generic adventure of the kind he had had before the War would help him settle into his latest incarnation, the Doctor decided to give it a check. Wrapping his battered leather jacket more tightly around his body like a suit of armor he descended into the shop basement of Henrik’s department store after the staff shift had ended. 

...Which was why he was more than startled when Aive let out a surprised but happy bark and took off without him, leaving him no choice but to chase after to ease the uncomfortable sensation of being parted at great distance from his Daemon. He nearly tripped over her tail when he rounded a corner and found that she was lying on the floor facing another Daemon, this one a large Pitbull of the grey-blue fur variety with the crisp white underbelly. He was covered in raw barely-healed scars, looking for all the world as if he’d just been rescued from a dogfighting ring, but when he lifted his head with ice blue eyes the Doctor felt his hearts stutter in his chest.

This was his Daemon. The manifestation of his soul made corporeal in the real world. He felt connected to both he and Aive now. 

“Where is she?” He murmured softly, tripping over the lower gruff Northern tones of his new voice. 

“Trapped,” came the response in an identical voice. “The door closed before I was able to follow through, but she’s inside.” 

“Move over,” Aive said crossly as she trotted toward the door. The Doctor’s Daemon watched her with interest, making no move to stop her and even looking vaguely amused. Within moments she had got the door handle between her jaws and pulled hard; the Doctor’s as-yet unnamed Daemon immediately darted through the opening as they heard the distinct sound of the locking mechanism breaking. The Doctor was only two steps behind, and he shuddered when her hand slid into his.

“Run!” 

They tore out of the room with the mass of Autons inside and ran for the lift, their Daemons bringing up the rear protectively. Neither said a word until the doors had closed and she was clutching the plastic arm.

“This is you, saving planets again?” She asked softly. He swallowed and turned to her, nodding. He was captivated by the tongue-touched grin she flashed before stumbling backwards as she threw her arms around his neck and hugged tightly. “Hi.”

“Hello.” 

“I’m Rose,” she laughed. “Rose Tyler.” She pointed to their Daemon. “That’s Jayr. What ‘bout you?” The Doctor blinked; despite his best efforts he was finding it difficult to remain aloof with the girl he had waited so long for all his lives. 

“I’m the Doctor. That’s Aive.” 

“Hi,” Aive said brightly, tail wagging as she addressed her human with their shared voice. The wolf glanced at Jayr, who hadn’t said anything since he’d told them what was wrong, and then leaned over and gently licked his nose. The Pitbull whimpered softly and stuck his head under her chin. Rose smiled and rubbed him between the shoulder blades; the Doctor blinked as he saw the tension visibly drain from his Daemon’s body. 

“So, you gonna blow up the building or what?” Rose asked as she straightened back up again. The Doctor nodded. “Can I come with?”

“I don’t know if it- if it would be possible for you to not,” he said in a small, soft voice. Her expression softened and she came in to hug him underneath his jacket, her human heat searing gloriously into his skin through his jumper as the lift ascended all the way to the top of the building. 

…^…

Later, after the end of the world and Cardiff and Slitheen, after the last Dalek and Adam being an idiot, the Doctor felt like he could ask a very important question. He asked to know what his past incarnations’ Daemons looked like. His own was currently healing, the scars fading after being ripped open again in Utah. To his surprise, Rose left the library only to return a few moments later with a small scrapbook.

“I took pictures,” she explained as she sat next to him and leaned against his side. The Doctor nodded, fingers wrapped around the front cover when he paused. Did he really want to know? 

...Yes.

The first Daemon almost brought him to tears. It was a Rassilonian Owl in all its glory, sharp hazel eyes more blue than green staring out at him. Rose was maybe about five when the picture had been taken, he noted, and his fingers ghosted over the picture before noticing that a portraiture of his first incarnation had been tacked on as well.

“How-“

“Alistair would send them to me whenever you regenerated, let me know what the last version of you had looked like,” she explained softly. Whenever he took a picture for the U.N.I.T. records he sent a copy to me when that body died.”

“Oh.” He went back to staring at the scrapbook. Two whole pages had been filled of Rose and Jayr at varying ages, and in the top left corner he noted the words _1986-1991, Up to Age 5_. He flipped to the next portion and was not at all surprised to see a picture of his second self grinning back at him. A Rovie Mouse. Oh, but it was too accurate. The Doctor stifled a snicker at it but quickly sobered, taking in the photographs of Jayr sleeping on her shoulder or tickling her with the fluffy tip of his tail. _1991-1993, Ages 5-7._ They seemed... happy. 

Swallowing, he flipped to the next set. _1993-1995, Ages 7-9_. There were a few pictures of his Third self this time, pictures of him with Alistair, Benton, Yates. Liz, Jo, Sarah. He let out a breath and sighed in self-recrimination; he’d been so busy trying to get away that he hadn’t properly realized how much he could have had in one place and time. It hadn’t felt that way then, but now... Focusing on his Daemon the most he could do was blink in surprise. A White Lion, huge in comparison to the girl sitting on his back or curled asleep between large, protective velveted paws. Quite impressive, really. Impressive and... playful, if some of the photos of Jayr lying on his back batting at a cat toy were any indication. 

_1995-2000, Ages 9-14._ The Doctor couldn’t help it. He burst out laughing. His Fourth self, Cheshire Grin and scarf and all, had been mad as a... well, as a March Hare. Literally. More than four of the pictures depicted Jayr in the middle of some form of chaos tearing through the flat, these taken by Rose it seemed as Jackie was usually in the process of chasing after him with a thunderous expression on her face. He even had a hand-knit scarf that was too long for him and looked as if it had been tripped over several times. It was just so him and so... so carefree...

The Doctor hesitated before going on to the next set. He knew what happened to that version of him, the innocence broken by Adric’s death. He took a deep breath and roughly turned it over, making himself meet his Fifth self’s gaze for a few moments before looking at the other photos and shaking his head slightly in fond exasperation at the Golden Retriever with the shaggy tail and big blue eyes. _2000-2002, Ages 14-16_. There were quite a few photos of him chasing after a ball, or cuddling with her on the couch or her bed. Most of them looked happy, but there were a few where he seemed quite sad. The Doctor inhaled sharply and abruptly flipped to the next set, snickering.

Macaw Parrot, and he looked like he was about to get hit with a fly swatter. Oh, the Doctor could just picture his Sixth self and Jackie getting into it. _2002-2003, Ages 16-17_. In one of them Jayr was standing on Perdido’s head, in another preening some very ruffled feathers. Boisterous, larger than life. But the pictures where he was with Rose he was usually perched on her shoulder with his eyes closed looking more than content to be there. 

The next one was of his Seventh self and he grimaced at the image, gently fondling Aive’s ears as she snorted and pointedly nipped him lightly on the arm. Arctic Fox, summer coat. And those eyes seemed to be burning into his soul. Even when he was with Rose, Jayr seemed to be attentively taking everything in; he never appeared relaxed nor content. Always meddling, especially it seemed where Jackie’s slippers were concerned, and looking as if he were weighing the pros and cons of the universe. _2003-2004, Ages 17-18._

The next one... Oh, the next one...

“I don’t have a picture for him,” Rose said softly from where she was snuggled against his chest. Jayr was asleep on her legs, Aive curled against his other side. Trapped as he was, the Doctor willed the TARDIS to do him a favor. He smiled slightly as he picked up the picture from the end table and handed it to her, hearts shuddering to a halt when she gasped and gently ran her finger over his Eighth self’s face. To his surprise tears welled up in her eyes. 

“Rose?”

“I just- This is before, yeah?”

“How could you tell?”

“You look happy...” The Doctor looked, really looked, at the picture and swallowed back a sudden lump in his throat. 

“That was- Lucie, she was a friend of mine, she- I didn’t know that she had the camera, and...” 

He’d been caught unawares, a cookie almost entirely shoved into his mouth, bright blue eyes startled but alight with amusement and some sheepishness at having been caught with his hand in the literal and proverbial cookie jar. 

“...I was happy,” he finished softly. 

“I’ll add it in later tonight,” Rose murmured, taking the picture and showing it to Jayr. The Daemon tilted his head slightly toward it and whined softly before climbing over her legs and nuzzling her arm. 

“What did you look like then, eh old boy?” The Doctor asked, hesitantly stroking one of Jayr’s ears. Unnerved by his own eyes staring back at him he turned the page and smiled softly. “Oh.”

_2004-2005, Ages 18-19_. A stag with gleaming white eight-point antlers and a shiny chestnut coat. There were quite a few of him chasing Perdido around or pretending to rush a gorgeous horse Daemon the Doctor remembered as being Mickey’s, but then... then came the not so nice pictures. In some Jayr had long red wounds on his flanks or blackened antlers. In many he was missing pieces of the antlers or one of the two entirely. Clearly, things were not happy.

“There’s a lot of him in this one,” he said. Rose swallowed. 

“I wasn’t sure... you were in a war and I... it might not have been a good time, but I never wanted to forget a single moment of it.”

“I asked you once why you wanted pictures of me looking like that when I was no longer beautiful,” Jayr murmured. 

“And I said that you were always beautiful to me,” she shushed, gently running her hands over his head. “I don’t miss any of your forms more over the other but I do miss them. I miss their quirks and likes and dislikes, their strengths and their faults, as much as I love learning all your new ones.”

“Rose, I’m a _Pitbull,_ ” Jayr stressed unhappily. He opened his mouth to reveal sharp teeth and a strong jaw, maneuvering against her side to demonstrate broad shoulders. “I don’t exactly have a pedigree this time around.” 

“You know, Pitbulls may look tough but they’re one of the sweetest dogs you can ever get once you get to know them,” Rose said quietly. “But because they look the part they’re put into dog fights. That’s not who they are. You just have to take the time to see the beauty underneath the pain.” 

The Doctor, who had been listening to all of this, had to fight back tears. 

“That’s how you see me?” He whispered. Rose nodded, taking the scrapbook from his hands and flipping back to the beginning.

“I’m gonna point to a picture, and I want you to tell me the first thing that comes to mind okay?” Uncertain, he nodded. She began pointing to each of his past selves in turn. “One.” 

“Always knows best and won’t take no for an answer.” 

“Insecure. Two.”

“Cosmic hobo.”

“Searching for a home. Three.”

“Daredevil action hero.”

“Trapped. Four.”

“Manic.”

“Bouts of depression. Five.” 

“Naive.”

“ _Kind_. Six.” 

“Showboat.”

“Vulnerable. Seven.”

“...Chess- chessmaster.”

“Pawn.” The Doctor went very, very still.

“...What?” He whispered. Rose gazed at him steadily. 

“Time’s Champion, yeah? You were basically her errand boy. When people don’t have much control over their own lives, they tend to try to control as much as they can to make up for it, even if that ends up being the people around them. Now. Eight.”

“I-“ he was staring at her with wide eyes but dutifully regarded the photo. “Ah. Um, hopeless romantic.” 

“Optimist.” She drew her hand forward and placed it in the center of his chest. “You.”

“Broken,” he bit out miserably. 

“Redeemable,” Rose murmured, leaning forward and pressing a soft kiss to the side of his mouth. 

“Y-you really think so?”

“Yeah.” She kissed him solidly on the cheek this time and made to get up, but he drew her back. 

“No, stay. Please.” She smiled, snuggling contentedly against his side, and the Doctor let out a breath of relief as she dropped off to sleep. He felt safe. He felt... like he was home.

…^…

Shortly after the events in the library they changed across Jack Harkness. He was flirty, handsome, and outgoing. He was also closer to Rose in age, and the Doctor worried. He couldn’t help but notice Jayr trailing self-consciously behind her wherever she went and winced. 

His being self-conscious was not something he wanted broadcast, and here his Daemon was making it so blatantly obvious that he shuddered in embarrassment and disappeared under the grating for a few hours. Rose came to find him, hauling him out from underneath the console, and he sheepishly conceded that maybe being in so easy a place to find wasn’t the best hiding spot. 

Then came Cardiff, and Margaret the Slitheen. Then came Mickey Smith and there went the Doctor’s slowly-returning confidence. Rose had kissed him on Woman Wept, sure, but did she actually mean it? Everything went south and they were sitting on the jumpseat after leaving Raxicoricofallapatorious. He was fixing the bruises on her neck, and she leaned into him.

“Love you,” she whispered drowsily. The Doctor dropped his sonic screwdriver. 

He kissed her as the Vortex burned her apart, drawing it into himself. He told her she was fantastic, and then everything went wild. The Doctor properly woke up on the floor of the TARDIS in unfamiliar jimjams and a hazy recollection of actually doing several things between now and just after he’d regenerated but they were difficult to pin in place, so he decided he’d ask Rose later. 

There was also something distinctly... strange. It took a few moments to figure out what it was, but when he finally placed it he started to panic. 

“Aive? Aive!”

“She’s fine,” an unfamiliar voice said soothingly. The Doctor’s head whipped round to see a ferret sitting nearby, his eyes like melted chocolate and his fur an unholy mess of brown with a small patch of creamy white on his muzzle. He was long and gangly and looking far too amused. 

“...Jayr?” The Doctor asked uncertainly. The Daemon nodded happily and in one swift bound leapt onto the console. “Where’s Aive?”

“With Rose. See, there’s a bunch of homicidal aliens out there and you were unconscious, and I’m not exactly big enough to protect her anymore so Aive went instead. Wolves tend to send the message, y’know? Besides, it’s not like switching Daemons is all that uncommon. People do it all the time, and are no worse the wear for it, and-“

The Doctor blinked several times as his Daemon rambled on and raised an eyebrow.

“Do I sound like that?” He murmured to himself. 

“Yep!” Jayr said happily. “Now get out there and help them.” 

“But I- okay.” 

Needless to say, he went along with it. And when everything was over and Rose had been scanned and prodded and poked for what seemed like hours and they’d found out her stint as Bad Wolf had made her a Proto-Gallifreyan on accident, she disappeared. The Doctor frowned at this, wondering if she didn’t like him anymore or if she didn’t want to change, and he moped in the library. A few minutes later Aive came in and snuggled in, licking him on the nose.

“Hi,” she mumbled. “You okay?”

“Rose,” he sighed simply. “So... got any insight as to how to deal with this?”

“I’d make sure there was actually something wrong first,” Aive suggested. “She’s probably wondering if there’s some sort of Time Lord ritual she needs to do after you regenerated or something.

“...Oh. Right. I didn’t exactly say anything informative, did I?” 

He got up and found her in her bedroom and he simply stood in the doorway blinking for a few moments. 

_2005-2007, Ages 19-21_. Instead of a single picture in the scrapbook there were several. Of Ninth him, of Jayr, of the three of them together and the places they’d seen. She was taking the time to select which made the cut and which didn’t out of a rather large selection. 

“This what you’ve been working on for the past two hours?” He asked softly, leaning over her shoulder to get a better look. Rose nodded, tilting her head up to kiss the underside of his jaw, and he shivered. She turned the last page and pointed to a new one. 

_2007-_

There was a single picture of Jayr, and two of him from Christmas; one with him and Rose, the other with Mickey throwing a snowball at him. 

“I do this every single time,” she explained matter-of-factly. Her mouth was still slightly open when he leaned down to kiss it. 

They were in Scotland and he’d finally settled into his new person when he said it.

“Eccentric,” he said out of the blue. 

“What?” Rose asked, looking up from her magazine as he tinkered underneath the console. 

“Eccentric,” the Doctor repeated, sliding out to look at her properly. “How I’d describe this new me.”

“Ah. Um... sensitive,” she replied. He quirked an eyebrow. “You take everything with your hearts on your sleeve, even if you act like no one can see what you’re feeling,” she explained. “And it’s one of the things I love about you.” His answering grin could have put the stars to shame. 

While at first glance Sarah Jane was annoyed with Rose, the realization that the Doctor finally got to be with his soulmate had her practically squeezing the life out of said Tyler woman. They got along perfectly fine, all things considered, and she could not stop gushing over how big Aive was - something which the Daemon took with smug pride. 

…^…

“A door, which once opened, can be walked through in either direction,” Reinette said in a sultry tone as she batted her eyelashes. The Doctor blinked.

“Um...” Reinette suddenly shouted in pain, and he looked down to see Aive with her fangs buried deep into the girl’s calf. “Aive, let go!”

“You are so marrying Rose after this,” the Daemon snapped as she released her victim. Her hackles were raised as she stalked off. “Assuming she still wants you.”

“But-“

“You can have Jayr the rest of the night. I don’t even want to look at you right now.” The Doctor swallowed uncomfortably and followed after, casting a glare at Reinette as he went. 

“I was trying to help you,” he muttered. “Thanks for that. Now I’m in trouble with the missus.”

“It is not uncommon for soulmates to take a secondary lover where I am from,” Reinette explained. “Is it not the same where you-“

“No!”

Needless to say, the Doctor spent a lot of time hoping Rose wouldn’t leave him and treating her like royalty before even considering popping the question. Not until they’d dealt with the Devil on Krop Tor, where they almost lost one another. And when they went back to ask Jackie to help - ‘she’ll never forgive us otherwise Doctor, you know that’ - that was when everything went wrong. 

An army of ghosts, straight from the Void, and forgotten horrors from the Time War. A beach, separated by an entire universe.

…^…

It was years, several years, before Jayr changed again. Time went by faster in the parallel world, but all the same... 

_2007-2083, Ages 21-97._ His new form was a Dingo. Rich brown pelt, inquisitive green eyes, legs too long for his body and it seemed he often forgot he had a tail because he couldn’t go a week without tripping over it. One of the ears was floppy while the other was always straight up, giving him a comical look, but to Rose she worried. Dingos were deceptive. They looked like dogs but hid a darker nature, and she worried her soulmate pretended to be happy until something came along to set him off. 

So she picked up the Dimension Cannon project she’d never got working when she was younger - before Tony and toys and then marriage, before her nieces and nephews and the Silurian negotiations she’d spearheaded. 

…^…

She arrived on an asteroid base in what appeared to be a battle, blinking when she saw a Roman Centurion walk past with a baby clutched to his chest after taking her from the eyepatch lady. Jayr still seemed suspicious of the eyepatch lady, claiming the baby ‘hadn’t smelled right,’ and so they followed. And when Rose realized they’d been had - whoever ‘they’ were, although the dad holding a clone of his baby was not good - she made sure to rescue the real baby while the lady was busy monologuing to a voice on the other end of the comm system that she’d only ever heard her Daemon use. 

“I’m coming Doctor,” she whispered, the baby crying softly as she clutched it to her chest. 

A ginger woman was sobbing when she arrived, the Centurion trying desperately to comfort her while spilling tears himself. 

“This yours?” Rose asked, eyeing the Silurion advancing on her with a hiss. She muttered something in the lizard lady’s own language and watched her come up short, eyes going wide in surprise, and promptly ignored her as she handed the baby over to its rightful parents. 

“How...?” The Centurion asked, incredulous. Rose shrugged. 

“Jayr said the baby you took smelled off in the corridor, so we followed the eyepatch lady and stole the kid back when she wasn’t looking.” 

“Rose?” She turned and smiled softly at the unfamiliar man staring at her. 

“Doctor. Think we can reschedule for the church, or do we have to do some temporal joggers-pokery?” 

It’s years later, after they’ve married and been on their honeymoon and watched little Melody Pond - ‘It’s Williams Doctor, not Pond’ - grow into a troublemaking preteen, and they’re sitting in bed playing with their two month old son ignoring the cubes, that he says something.

“Childish.”

“Happy,” Rose counters, tapping her baby gently on the nose. His name is Braxiatel, after the Doctor’s brother, and he was absolutely perfect. A set of one of his father’s pairs of blue eyes, with curly black hair and light freckles dusting his nose. 

_2083-2362, Ages 97-376_. 

…^…

The Doctor brushed the Yorkie-sized black dragon with the speckling of bioluminescent silver scales off of his shoulder, ignoring the indignant protest and fiery blue eyes currently judging him from the top of the bed canopy. 

“You’re worse than a cat, you know that?” He muttered. Jayr hissed pointedly and turned his back.

“Still not getting along, huh?” Rose asked sympathetically from the door to the en-suite. 

“No.” His impressive eyebrows furrowed slightly before he spoke again. “Grumpy.”

“Content,” Rose countered with a purr as she sauntered over and slid her arms around his neck. “Love you.”

“Love you too,” he mumbled into her hair, kissing a slow trail down her neck to nuzzle delicately at her shoulder. 

They were startled by a loud banging on the door and flashed each other a grin as Bill’s voice filtered through.

“Are we going or not!?”

“Keep your shirt on,” the Doctor chuckled. “It’s not like your new roommates are going to be annoyed if you show up ten minutes late!”

“Ten minutes?” Rose asked, raising an eyebrow and looking pointedly at her person, which had I brushed hair, was devoid of makeup, and clad in only knickers. 

“Two hours,” the Doctor amended with a smirk, raising his voice. “Rose has her ‘routine.’” 

Laughter filled the hall as Rose hauled off and smacked him in the arm.

_2362-????, Ages 376-???..._

**Author's Note:**

> So, brief notes of interest. Erimem was a companion of the Fifth Doctor in the Big Finish Audio Adventures who had a cat named Antranak. Likewise, there is a story called ‘The Spectre of Lanyon Moor’ from Big Finish that features the Sixth Doctor and Evelyn Smythe that is vaguely referenced. The Sixth Doctor, in Big Finish, also had a habit of mimicking people he didn’t particularly like if he wanted to purposefully annoy them. Charley and Lucie traveled with the Eighth Doctor in Big Finish, and the story referenced is called ‘Human Resources’. Rovie Mice, Rassilon’s Owls, Horse-Cats, and Cobblemice are Gallifreyan native creatures that are referenced in EU books, comics, Big Finish, etc. Every Daemon’s name has a special meaning. While only Aive and Jayr are explained, all of them have it. 
> 
> Susan was not the Doctor’s actual granddaughter in this story but his pseudo-adopted one purely for the reason that I realized that in a world of soulmates he would never have married anyone else. Likewise Mickey and Rose never dated, and she never ran off with Jimmy Stone. Eight never regenerated into War on Karn because Aive would not have let him get himself killed for a woman who didn’t want him there. 
> 
> I have no plans to continue this, it was a Oneshot, and while I liked experimenting with a Daemon AU it is not my particular cup of tea. I have not seen Jodie Whittaker because I don’t have BBC America and Season 11 is not yet available on Prime, and as such I can’t form an opinion on what hers would be. I really struggled with whether to include Capaldi or not because I felt a perfect place for the story to end would be with her reunion with the Eleventh Doctor, but then I decided a soft epilogue was a nice way to wrap everything up and not leave anything in the air. 
> 
> I’ve seen a lot of Daemon AUs that incorporate soulmates, but rarely in the way that actually melds the two together (at least for Doctor Who), and wanted to play around with that a little bit. Hope you like the mechanics I employed, the way I meshed them together. I really enjoyed the idea and just ran with it.


End file.
